Epoxy resin is a demanding material for the electrical and electronics packaging industries due to its excellent properties such as good adhesion properties, good electrical properties and low shrinkage during the curing process. However, due to its low thermal conductivity and low compressive strength limits its applications in various industrial applications. In this paper, different wt% of alumina (Al2O3)-graphene nanoplatelets (GnP) were dispersed in the epoxy matrix to improve the compressive performance and thermal stability of epoxy nanocomposites. The Al2O3-GnP reinforced epoxy nanocomposites showed the significant improvement of 107.3% in compressive strength and 25.3% in compressive modulus corresponding to the combined loading of 2 wt% of Al2O3 and 0.5 wt% GnP sample as compared to the neat epoxy test coupons. The thermal stability of the composite samples was investigated by TGA and showed an appreciable improvement in the 10% loss of degradation of temperature. This improvement was associated with the homogeneous dispersion of Al2O3-GnP in the epoxy resin through the sonication and ball milling process. © 2019 IOP Publishing Ltd.